


Hello

by Technicolor



Series: El Rey [1]
Category: From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 14:10:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5500184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Technicolor/pseuds/Technicolor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What would have happened if Richie and Seth didn't reconcile and they had led somewhat normal lives before their trip to El Rey?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hello

He never could find a vein, not on his own. Just like how he could never survive on his own, so here he was. Laying in a pool of his own vomit, overdosing on Mexican heroin.

It had weeks since everyone had left him and hours since he collapsed onto the cool tile of the cheap hotel’s bathroom floor, leaving him to drown in his thoughts.

That's when he tried to call to her, the one person who he hadn’t truly pushed away - Renata.

“Renata,” He whispered over and over, trying to push himself onto his back.

Finally getting enough momentum to turn himself, he jumped at the sight of the youngest Malone sister’s ghostly appearance.

“Seth.” Renata whispered his name back, a dead look in her eyes as she stared at him. She was leaning against the bathroom doorway, crouching down beside him as she lightly touched his cheek. “What in the hell have you gotten yourself into?”

“I - “ He began, feeling another round of vomit coming.

“Shh.” She silenced him, hoisting him up and leaning him on the tub. Rubbing his back, she tried to bring him a calmness. “It’s okay, just let it out.”

For twenty minutes straight, he threw up everything that was and wasn’t in his stomach. In between the retching, he began to cry and apologize, a behavior that was very unlike Seth. Seth had never been one to apologize or cry, no matter what the situation was. But, this world had broken him, finally, just like everyone else he had ever loved. There was no more Gecko Brothers, no Cat and Renata, no more Kate and Seth couldn’t handle the loss anymore. 

Had he really decided to take his own life or was he just that reckless these days? He didn’t know the answer to that and when he finally felt like he couldn’t puke anymore, he lifted his hand to signal to Ren that he was finished.

“Alright, big guy, let’s get you to bed.” Hoisting him up from the tub, she turned him to face her for a moment. She had to know that there was something there, some sort of life left in his eyes before she helped him anymore. There was already going to be enough hell to pay when she told Richie what she did, but she couldn’t turn her back on Seth. He was the one other person, besides herself, that her sister had every truly loved.

“Ren,” He mumbled, trying to grab onto her shoulders, clearly weak. “I, we, we need to talk.”

Instinctively, she pulled him into a hug. Not letting her strength falter, she quickly wiped the tear that began to escape her eyes. “Okay, we can talk about all of this, but first you need to lay down.”   
The firmness in her voice reminded her of Cat, making Ren realize that this was probably the reason that Seth had done this. The loss of the baby and Cat, he probably thought this was the only way to be with them.

Laying him down, Ren sat at the foot of the bed, staring at him. For the first time since the night that Cat had left, Ren felt the guilt and sorrow in her stomach again. Usually, she had numbed her own feelings, by laying around with Santanico or going to tiny ass movie theaters with Richie. Now, she was forced to face her problem head on, in the face of Seth Gecko.

“I wasn’t trying to kill myself.” He whispered, laying a hand over his eyes. “I just, I let my thoughts get to me. I didn’t even mean to call for you, but you’re the only one that I can talk to.”

“I know Seth,” Trying to hide her frown, she covered him with the thin, itchy comforter that lay wadded up next to him.

“No, Ren, I need to talk to you about what we went through. The last things I said to Richie, Kate, and Catherine.”  
 Catherine. He used her full name, something that was only reserved for situations that were never spoke of. She hadn’t been Catherine since she was five years old, when Eddie ruffled her hair and telling both sisters that she was more of a wild animal and not a young lady. Their mother had smacked Eddie in the chest when he said this, but Ren knew that it was true and so it stuck, that childish nickname.

“I blamed Richie for everything.” Renata’s eyes shot up, trying to read the expression on Seth’s face. “I left him at the Twister because I was angry at him for picking Her over me, when I never should have ever made him choose. It wasn’t fair and I knew it, but I was pissed off at myself for letting this happen to him. I blamed myself because if I would have never went to prison, maybe we’d all be sitting in K.C., enjoying margaritas and planning our families - like we were supposed to.”

Tears were in her eyes now, she remembered the night that Seth came home and told her that Richie had died. She had never been so angry in her life, how could he have let that happen? All they were supposed to do was pay the way to El Rey and come get the girls once everything had been settled, but no, he had let Richie die in some sort of horrible ending. Then, she saw him. She had gone back to see the place where Richie had died, to say goodbye to it before they headed back to the States, to try and start over. He sat on a wooden chair that Ren would have mistaken as a throne, with Her on his lap. She heard Seth clear his throat and she jumped, she had realized that she had been digging her nails into the mattress, leaving an indention.

“I just wanted my brother back, the one who stood by me no matter what. I felt like I had given him my whole life by protecting him and doing what I could to take care of him, then it was gone. We were a million miles apart and I was left on my own, I felt like my own heart had been ripped out.”  “How do you think I felt, Seth?” Renata growled. “You two were thick as thieves and I loved Richie with all my heart, do you know how much it hurt me when I went back to the Twister and saw him there with Her? Before I knew everything, I thought that he had just decided to leave me because some whore was after ‘Los Hermanos Gecko.’ If you would have just been honest with me - “

“Renata, I know and I’m so sorry. I just felt like it was the right thing to do, he wasn’t Richard anymore and I didn’t want them to eat you alive because I knew it would eat Cat alive to lose you, just like it was doing to me.”

Hanging her head, Renata tried to justify his actions, understand that Seth did it because he was thinking of her best interests; even if there was a selfish beginning to his actions, he had put her and Cat first and tried to protect them.

“Is that why you’re doing the heroin? Richie told me about your little Mexican honeymoon with Kate.” There was a deadness in her voice when she thought of her, a deep anger smacking her in the face when she thought of how no one had seemed to discuss it. They just all accepted that she was gone and taken Richie’s word, sweeping it under the rug like she had never even been one of them. But, that was it, wasn’t it? She was never meant to be, Kate was never supposed to become an honorary Gecko. When they had all decided to kidnap the Fullers as their free ticket to Mexico, they were never to see them again after they got into El Rey. Then Seth brought the broken little girl home and told both sisters that her family had been killed with Richie, that they were all Kate had left. She was family now.

“Kate was different and you know it, Renata.” The high was beginning to wear off and he was getting irritable as he struggled to sit himself up in the bed. “I fucked up by taking her, Jacob, and Scott. When I made her get out of the car after the mall, I thought I was doing the right thing. I hadn’t been able to save anyone else but I thought I could do right by her. She was my chance to do something right for a change.”

Renata could hear the sorrow in his voice, it was hurting him just as much to not talk about her. 

“We plucked her out of this small town and expected her to accept everything that was thrown at her, tried to force her to lose hope in God. I always put my needs first when it came to her, never asked her if she was okay with what was going on around us. Now, I’ll never be able to tell her that I’m sorry.”

None of them would be able to and Ren finally allowed herself to mourn for the lost innocence of Kate, letting the tears fall. “We did what we thought was right, Seth, we loved her like our own. She would have forgiven us for everything we did to her, I trust in her faith. The Gecko clan may have never believed, but Kate believed enough for all of us.”

“She told Richie to burn in Hell.” The words came so fast and Seth turned to stare out the window, avoiding the pure hurt that he knew would in Ren’s eyes.

“Well, as much as I love Richie, you know sometimes he has to hear things like that to bring him down from his cloud.” A smile came to her face and Seth let out a chuckle before turning to her.

“I’m sorry for blaming you too, Ren.” A morose expression came to his face as he thought about the night that he had lost Cat. “You did what no one else would, I just couldn’t look past my own anger to thank you for what you did.”

“Seth, I didn’t make the right decision though. The baby is gone and she won’t even answer my phone calls.”

The baby. Something that was finally making things feel normal, something that was a reason for them to get to El Rey. They needed protection and a chance to be a normal family and this was the best reason they had in years, but it was taken from them when Carlos had decided to punish them all for his downfall.

In his tantrum, he shot Cat and dared anyone else to come near them because they’d suffer the same fate. Renata felt like her whole world was crashing and she remembered the moment as something like a bad movie. Blood everywhere as Seth tried to put pressure on the bleeding and Richie just stared, horrified to see his best friend laying on the floor clutching her stomach. It was Santanico that went for Carlos, letting Renata make the decision to turn her sister.

Cat put up the best fight she could, telling Ren that she didn’t want this and to just let her die. But, in her own selfishness, she couldn’t live without her sister and decided to inject her with the live-giving venom. She remembered the dead look in Cat’s eyes as she finally lost the fight, accepting her fate like it was a worse death sentence than the gunshot wounds through her stomach. 

“We both failed her, didn’t we?” She could see that he had been crying for some time now, whether it was about Cat or the baby, the tears were fresh on his cheeks. “After you turned her, she just laid in bed, constantly crying. I tried to talk to her and she was just so angry, angry at me because I didn’t understand. I wanted my wife back and I blamed her for being a culebra, even though it wasn’t yours or her fault. I want you to know that, Ren, I’m so grateful for every day that I know she’s still here, even if she doesn’t love me anymore.”

“She still loves you, Seth, trust me. You don’t know how hurt she was when Santanico told her about Sonja.”

“I used Sonja as a distraction from my own feelings, I never felt anything but true love for her. Even when we first found out about you and Richie, I was kind of glad because it gave me a chance to talk to her besides her flipping me off at every gig.”

Ren smiled, a small giggle escaping her lips. “She really hated you at first, I’m pretty sure she told me that she was going to trip you the next time we saw you at the grocery store.”

Laughter began to fill the room as they thought of a much happier time, before they were both so jaded.

“I’ve tried to call her,” Seth finally confessed, when the laughter died down. “I’ve tried to apologize to her for hurting her when she needed me, like I always do.”

Grabbing his hand, Renata tried to give him a comforting smile. “Come home with me? Try to talk to Richie, please? Maybe we can find Cat.”

Seth tried to pull away, a reluctance taking over him. “Ren, I really think it’s best if I - “

“Shut up, Seth, and listen to me. You need us and I’m not asking to turn you, just please come home and be with your family. We need you just as much as you’ve need us tonight.”   
Running his fingers through his hair, he finally nodded. “Fine, but strictly trial and if - “

“We want you there, Seth, I promise.”

“Fine, but if I want out, you guys can’t hold it against me.”

“I doubt you’ll want to leave once you’re back home, but I understand you.”

Helping him off the bed, Renata went to the chair to grab him his suit jacket.

“Thanks, by the way.” Pulling on his jacket, he turned to face her. 

“For what?” Playing coy, Renata knew he owed her nothing, that she was simply paying him back for every nice thing he had ever done for her.

Kissing her on the top of the forehead, Seth put her arm around her. “You’ll use it against me and we know we can’t have that, Remmie.”

Shaking her head, she laughed at the use of her old nickname from him. “Just wait until the day that I find something embarrassing to call you, Seth Gecko.”


End file.
